


(a pretty picture but) the scenery is so loud

by shineyma



Series: medium!jemma [2]
Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon, Clairvoyance, F/M, Post-Season/Series 01
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-05
Updated: 2016-04-05
Packaged: 2018-05-31 12:36:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,521
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6470224
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shineyma/pseuds/shineyma
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When it comes to imprisonment by the United States Air Force, being able to speak to the dead is both more and less helpful than one might expect.</p>
            </blockquote>





	(a pretty picture but) the scenery is so loud

**Author's Note:**

> This took FOREVER to finish, my goodness, but finally, here it is: the sequel to [back away from the water (babe, you might drown)](http://archiveofourown.org/works/4580082). You'll probably wanna read that first, if you haven't already. There are also a couple of drabbles in this verse, which you can find in [my medium!jemma verse tag on tumblr](http://shineyma.tumblr.com/tagged/verse%3A-medium%21jemma/chrono).
> 
> Thanks for reading and, as always, please be gentle if you review!

Ten minutes after what sounds like a base-wide alarm draws their interrogators away, the question of its origin is answered—conclusively—when Thomas barrels into the room.

It is, perhaps, fortunate that Jemma is currently restrained; were she not, there’s no way she could prevent herself from hugging the clearly terrified little boy when he throws himself onto her lap.

And, as Skye is sitting right next to her…

Torn between gratitude that she won’t be forced to explain hugging an invisible child and worry over Thomas’ state, Jemma looks pleadingly at Grandfather Charles. Jessy, as the more tactile, would be preferable, but as she fled hours ago (after the first very graphic threat was made against Jemma), Grandfather Charles will have to do.

And she’s sure he’ll do admirably.

“What’s all this, then?” he asks, crouching to rest his hand on Thomas’ back.

The answer, horrifyingly, comes not from Thomas, but the man who follows him in. “Kid can’t take a joke, that’s all.”

The very first word has Thomas latching on to Grandfather Charles with a wail that drowns out Jemma’s entirely involuntary curse…or at least it _would_ , were it not for the small fact of Thomas being _dead_.

As it is, Jemma is the only person in the room that Skye can hear, and she startles badly at Jemma’s sudden exclamation.

“What?” she demands, straining against her bonds in an attempt to reach Jemma. “What’s wrong? Are you hurt? You _said_ you weren’t hurt!”

“I’m not,” Jemma promises numbly. She should look at Skye—it would doubtless be more reassuring than staring blankly into space—but she can’t quite tear her eyes away from John Garrett and his mocking smile.

“Yeah,” he says, softly, with a sweeping glance that makes her skin crawl. “The kid said you could see us. Gotta be honest, I half thought he was havin’ me on—but here we are.”

Thomas is still crying, despite Grandfather Charles’ best efforts to soothe him, and for a moment, she hesitates, torn between the long-ingrained habit of keeping her secret and the need to demand to know _precisely_ what Garrett—the bastard—has done to upset him.

“Simmons?” Skye prompts, plainly worried by her silence.

Oh, honestly. What’s more important: keeping her secret or helping Thomas?

She opens her mouth, but before she can decide precisely how to explain this—or, indeed, whether she should start with explanations or simply allow Skye to believe her insane as she yells at Garrett—Grandfather Charles beats her to the punch.

“What have you done?” he demands, sounding impressively threatening for a man with a crying child on his hip.

Jemma thinks quickly as Garrett (very unconvincingly) protests his innocence. As long as Grandfather Charles is willing to handle this, it’s better to let him; after all, there’s a very obvious camera in the corner of the room, which means that revealing her ability to Skye will also reveal her ability to anyone who ever happens to watch the surveillance footage.

“It’s nothing, really,” she tells Skye. “I was trying to wiggle out of the ropes and I—I think I twisted my wrist too far, that’s all. It’s fine, it just hurt for a moment, see?”

She tugs against her restraints for emphasis, and perhaps the trick to telling successful lies is to be distracted while voicing them (for she is _very_ distracted by the glaring match happening between Grandfather Charles and Garrett), because Skye relaxes visibly.

“Whew,” she says. “Don’t scare me like that, Simmons.”

“Sorry,” Jemma says, but it’s lost under the _bang_ of the door slamming open.

The dead, for whatever reason, are only limited by the physical plane when they so choose. She’s seen Thomas perch on a table that Jessy walks through, seen Grandfather Charles stand on water and the agents who follow Coulson splash in the ocean. They seem to go from solid to intangible at will without any trouble at all.

All of which is to say, Thomas and Garrett were both able to enter the room _through_ the door without opening it.

Their newest company, however, has no such ability, and thus the slamming.

It’s Skye’s turn to swear, but Jemma—who of course knew he must be _somewhere_ nearby the moment she saw Thomas—merely watches in resignation as Ward kicks the door shut.

“There you are.” His eyes are locked on hers, and she swallows at the intensity in them. “I’ve been looking for you everywhere.”

“What do _you_ want, Ward?” Skye demands, tone sharp enough to cut glass. Jemma winces. Her evasiveness on the topic of the confrontation that ended with Ward gone and her unconscious has left the team with some unfortunate impressions she’s at a loss how to correct.

It’s unfair of her to let them go on thinking he did something horrible to her, but what can she do? Tell them she acted as an intermediary between Ward and his dead little brother, which somehow led to him fleeing without another word?

Even _imagining_ that conversation makes her cringe, and so she’s kept her silence.

If Ward is puzzled by Skye’s hostility, however, he doesn’t show it.

“Nice to see you, too, Skye,” he says dryly.

Garrett has abandoned his argument with Grandfather Charles (to which Jemma has only half been listening, as it seemed to be going in circles) in favor of frowning at Grant.

“The kid told me what happened, you know,” he says, addressing the words to Jemma. “How it’s ‘cause of you I’m dead.”

“You’re dead because you’re Nazi _scum_ ,” Grandfather Charles spits, and Garrett laughs harshly.

“Oh, no,” he says. “I had it all planned out. Grant would’ve tagged along as an escort to the Fridge, crossed off Hand and her goons, and freed me so we could get down to business. Then little Miss Cleo here stuck her nose in it and got him all shook up.”

Ward is crouching in front of Jemma, using a worryingly large knife to cut through the ropes binding her right wrist to the arm rest of her chair. She wonders if _he’s_ wondered about Garrett—if he knows his mentor was killed trying to escape en route to the Fridge, or if he thinks he’s safely locked away in it.

It’s been months since the Hub. She wonders what he’s been doing.

“I’m the only real father that boy’s ever had,” Garrett says, “and thanks to you and little Tommy over there, he abandoned me to death.” He smiles unpleasantly. “Now maybe you two can live with that, but Grant? He’s gonna spend the rest of his life sitting up at night, thinking about how he let me down—because of _you_.”

Thomas’ tears stopped at some point, but at that, his breath hitches audibly, and Jemma—heart aching with the thought of the kind of torment Thomas must have been suffering at Garrett’s hands all these months—snaps, “Oh, go _away_.”

Garrett, to her utter astonishment, disappears with a _pop_.

As she, Thomas, and Grandfather Charles all stare blankly at the place where Garrett used to stand, Ward pauses in the act of freeing her other wrist.

“You got something against being rescued?” he asks lightly.

With effort, she drags her eyes away from the empty space before her ( _what just happened?_ ) to look at him. At the sight of his sharp smile, the bottom promptly drops out of her stomach.

He knows she wasn’t talking to him.

Skye, on the other hand, has no idea. “By you? Maybe we do.”

“Really? You’d rather take your chances with Talbot?”

Jemma grimaces before she can stop herself. For whatever reason, General Talbot is _convinced_ that Coulson is HYDRA, and has tarred the rest of them with the same brush. The Air Force views them as terrorists and traitors, and it’s already been made clear that if they’re anything less than perfectly cooperative, they’ll suffer terribly for it.

Unfortunately, by dint of _not_ being HYDRA, they have no intel to offer, and have therefore already been declared uncooperative. If they stay here, there’s nothing but pain in their future.

Beside her, Skye is silent.

“Yeah,” Ward says lightly, and finishes freeing Jemma’s left wrist. “That’s what I thought.”

“You made him go away,” Thomas says, voice filled with awe, and Grandfather Charles tuts.

“Coincidence,” he blusters—not that he looks any more confident than Jemma herself feels on that score.

The dead have always been very cooperative with her, answering whatever questions she puts to them without a qualm and even doing her favors to the best of their ability—one of her instructors at the Academy was followed by a dead girlfriend who was always happy to play look-out during Jemma’s…less advisable experiments—but actually disappearing on her order?

She’s _asked_ the dead to go away once or twice, and they’ve always complied, but those were _friendly_ dead. Garrett was the enemy in life and looked to be shaping up to be just as bad in death, so why on earth would he leave just because she told him to?

He wouldn’t—not if he had a choice. But if he _didn’t_ have a choice…

“Hello? Earth to Simmons!”

Jemma startles as a hand waves across her vision, and looks up to find that Skye is untied and leaning over her, concerned.

“What is _with_ you today?” she demands as soon as Jemma meets her eyes. “Did one of those assholes do something to you, because if they did—”

“No, no,” Jemma interrupts, pushing to her feet. “I’m fine, Skye, just—thinking.”

Ward motions to the door. “You can think once we’re outta here. Let’s move.”

She hesitates, darting a glance at the equally hesitant Skye. Their chances of making it off this very secure military base without aid are slim, but can they truly trust Ward? He might well lead them straight into HYDRA’s custody, and if there’s one thing worse than being held by Talbot…

“It’s okay, Jemma!” Thomas pipes up. “Grant won’t hurt you! He promised me he won’t.”

Jemma sighs. The value of a promise to a dead child is debatable—especially when the source of the promise is a known traitor—but it will have to do.

“Lead the way,” she invites, reluctantly, and shrugs in reply to Skye’s raised eyebrows. “It’s not as though we’ve much of a choice, is it?”

“Point,” Skye admits, and scowls at Ward. “But don’t even _think_ of trying anything, you creep.”

“I’m not even gonna ask what you think I might try,” Ward says, looking mildly amused. “Stick close.”

He draws his gun out of its holster, and Jemma seizes his wrist as he steps toward the door.

It’s an impulsive move, one she regrets almost at once as he smirks. There’s something heavy behind his gaze, and suddenly, all she can think about is that closet in the Hub, him promising so sincerely that he really did care about her—

And scaring the life out of her _and_ giving her bruises that lasted for _weeks_ , she reminds herself impatiently. Just because he had the decency not to kill her in front of his little brother is no reason to assign any credence to his claims.

“Need something?” he asks, tone low and inviting.

“Don’t kill anyone,” she orders, snatching her hand away, and his smirk is instantly replaced by incredulity.

“What?”

“She said don’t kill anyone,” Skye says, inserting herself smoothly between them. “These guys think we’re HYDRA, okay, they’re just trying to do the right thing.”

“Precisely,” Jemma agrees. “There’s no call to kill them just because—”

“Just because they were holding you prisoner and threatening you with torture?” Ward finishes dryly, but he’s already holstered his gun and drawn an ICER out of nowhere. “Fine, have it your way. But if it comes down to your life or theirs, I’m choosing yours.”

He’s very clearly addressing that to _her_ , not Skye, and it causes an odd tightness in her chest. She resolves to ignore it.

“Then let’s hope it doesn’t come to that,” she says, and grips tight to Skye’s hand as Ward yanks the door open.

 

 

 

Their journey through the base is long, arduous, and somewhat bloody, but by some miracle—or rather, by judicious application of Ward’s skill—they make it out in one piece _and_ without killing any of the innocent soldiers who get in their way.

Ward has a getaway car waiting for them just outside the base’s fence, and while Jemma and Skye are both reluctant, they don’t put up a fight when he chivvies them into it. It may be unwise to let him drive them _anywhere_ , but as the only thing around for miles is a particularly dense forest, they’re not likely to make it very far on foot. They’d undoubtedly be recaptured within the hour.

They’ve already made the choice to trust him—or rather, Jemma did, and Skye followed her lead—and it’s too late to back out now. All they can do is hope they won’t regret it.

It’s not at all encouraging that, a scant twenty minutes after they escape the base, Ward pulls his ICER out and shoots Skye twice.

“What—!” Jemma leans forward both to check on Skye and glare at Ward. She wishes she hadn’t let Skye take the front; she’s at a terrible angle to hit him. She makes do with thumping the top of his nearer shoulder. “What was _that_ for, you berk?”

“Oh, I’m sorry,” he says insincerely. “I was under the impression you wanted to keep your little psychic trick a secret.”

Oh, dear.

“I do,” she says, cautiously. “What does that have to do with anything?”

His fingers flex and tighten on the steering wheel. “Is Thomas here?”

“I’m here!” Thomas exclaims, scrambling over the back of the front bench to perch in the unconscious Skye’s lap. “Right here, Grant!”

He’s the only one; Grandfather Charles hates riding in cars—he was a speed demon in life, apparently, and greatly resents his current inability to drive—and thus disappeared as soon as they made it safely out of the base, and Jessy still hasn’t returned.

“Yes,” she says, sparing the excited Thomas a smile. “He is.”

“Okay.” Ward breathes in slowly. “And John?”

For a moment, she has no idea who he means…and then it clicks. Garrett.

“No,” she says, after a wary glance around the car—just in case he’s reappeared in the last two seconds. “It’s just Thomas.”

“But it wasn’t before, right?” he presses. “You told someone to go away earlier; you weren’t talking to Thomas.”

Thomas bites his lip, suddenly apprehensive. “Is Grant gonna be angry you made Garrett go away?”

Sheer habit nearly has her ignoring the question, but she reminds herself that Ward already knows about her ability—hence this conversation—and even if he didn’t, Thomas is clearly badly in need of reassurance. It would be cruel to ignore him.

“I don’t know,” she says, “but either way, that was hardly your doing. He won’t be angry with you.”

Ward spares her a glance, brow furrowed, but returns his gaze to the road without comment.

“But you made him go away because of _me_ ,” Thomas points out, with a child’s devastating logic.

“Not precisely,” she disagrees. “He was being awful; I’d have wanted him gone regardless.”

Thomas appears unconvinced, but doesn’t argue any further.

“Well?” Ward prompts after a moment.

Jemma sighs. “Garrett was in the interrogation room, yes. I told him to go away.”

From her position behind and somewhat to the right of him, she has an excellent view of the way his jaw tightens at that—and of the way his throat works silently for a moment before he speaks.

“So he really is dead, then.”

A quiet noise of distress escapes Thomas, and Jemma leans forward to pat his shoulder.

“Yes,” she says, watching Ward carefully. “I’m afraid so.”

He nods, almost to himself. “How? When?”

“En route to the Fridge,” she says. “He tried to escape, and—well—”

“Hand put him down,” he concludes, and there’s something so ugly in his voice that she flinches back out of pure reflex.

Ward takes a deep breath. Thomas holds his. (Unnecessarily, of course, but the dead do tend to keep some habits of life.)

“So he was following me?” Ward asks. “The way Thomas does?”

“Yes.”

“Until you told him to go away,” he says, “because he was being awful.”

There’s a question in his tone, and Jemma hesitates to answer it. What if Ward _is_ cross over Garrett being sent away—or even simply the criticism? She and poor Skye are _both_ depending on him at the moment; if she angers him, the consequences could be dire.

But she’s hardly in a position to refuse to answer, and so she takes the time to find a delicate way to word the very harsh truth.

(She also takes the time to be grateful that he doesn’t appear to be questioning the fact that Garrett _listened_ when she told him to go away, because she has no idea what she would say if asked about it. For the moment, she’s doing her best not to think about it at all; one problem at a time, and all that.)

“He was upsetting Thomas,” she says finally, resting her arms on the back of the seat. “I got the impression that he had been…well… _tormenting_ him for some time.”

Thomas studies his shoes—light up trainers bearing a cartoon figure she vaguely remembers from her own childhood—with great interest. Ward’s knuckles go white on the steering wheel.

“Why would he do that?” he asks evenly.

“He seemed to blame Thomas—and me—for his death,” she admits.

Ward chuckles humorlessly. “Of course he did.”

“Do you?” Thomas asks him, eyes wide and fearful.

Jemma isn’t entirely certain she wants to know, but when Thomas looks to her expectantly, she steels her spine to find out anyway. Thomas is completely blameless in this; if Ward is holding some sort of grudge against him, she needs to know so that she can fix it.

And so she gathers her courage and asks, “Do you?”

“…Is that you or Thomas asking?” Ward asks, after a worrying pause.

“Both of us, I suppose,” she says. “But Thomas is concerned.”

“Well, he doesn’t need to be,” he says strongly. “Not a damn bit of this is your fault—you hear me, Thomas? I don’t blame you for _anything_.”

Thomas slumps dramatically back against Skye in relief, only to sit up again immediately.

“ _Anything_?” he asks, a touch craftily. “Not even breaking your Howling Commando action figure set?”

Jemma laughs and, at a raised eyebrow from Ward, repeats the question.

“No,” Ward says, with a quiet laugh of his own. “Not even that.”

Thomas nods to himself, looking incredibly satisfied.

“He said he’d never forgive me,” he confides to Jemma. “But I knew he couldn’t stay mad _forever_.”

She smiles at his glee, heart much lighter than it was a moment ago. The tension in the car has been effectively shattered by Thomas’ question; even Ward appears calmer, his shoulders loose and hands light on the steering wheel.

They fall into a peaceful silence that, though lovely, is unfortunately short-lived. It doesn’t even last five minutes before Ward breaks it.

“What about you?”

Jemma blinks. “What _about_ me?”

“I’m not angry at you,” he says, “but you had some pretty strong things to say about _me_ the last time we talked. You still mad?”

Her stomach clenches unpleasantly, and she sits back, putting some distance between them. For a moment there, she almost managed to—not forget, precisely, but—put aside the truth of his character.

He’s HYDRA. He’s saved her and Skye and he cares about his brother and he hasn’t killed anyone (yet) today, but—he’s HYDRA. He is a traitor and a liar and she _cannot_ allow herself not to keep that in mind.

“I’ll take that as a yes,” he says, wryly, when she doesn’t answer.

“Did you expect a no?” she asks, honestly curious. “I’m grateful for the rescue, truly, but it doesn’t change anything. You’re still HYDRA.”

“I’m _not_ HYDRA,” he denies at once. “Like I told you, John and I were only partnered—”

“Oh, stop it,” she snaps, incensed by the reminder of his words at the Hub. As though an _alliance_ with HYDRA is really any better than loyalty to it. “That’s only semantics and you know it. You had knowledge of HYDRA and its crimes and did nothing to prevent them; that makes you complicit. Just as you were complicit by your silence in everything _Garrett_ did—shooting Skye, kidnapping and experimenting on Mike Peterson, having Coulson tor—”

“I get the picture,” he interrupts sharply, but it’s more the look on Thomas’ face than Ward’s tone that keeps her from continuing.

He’s plainly miserable, and guilt tugs at her heartstrings. He was so pleased a moment ago; it hurts to have caused that to change.

“I’m sorry, Thomas,” she says gently. “But you must know…”

“It’s okay,” he says, eyes downcast. “I know Grant’s still not good.” He brightens, a little. “But he’s getting better! That’s important.”

If it’s _true_ … “Yes. It’s very important.”

“What is?” Ward asks.

He sounds calm once more, but she’s not eager to aggravate him—and clearly the suggestion that he’s at fault does so easily. Jemma concludes that in this case, discretion is the better part of valor.

“Nothing,” she says. “Just a thought.”

“A thought about being angry at me?” he presses.

“From a certain perspective, I suppose,” she admits.

“Huh.”

Ward takes a quick look at the rear-view mirror and then, surprisingly, slows down to pull off to the shoulder. They’re still driving through the forest, and Jemma glances nervously at the dark, tall trees rising outside the window as he parks the car, wondering if he’s angrier at her non-answer than he appears. If he’s about to kick them out and abandon them here…

Well, she truly doesn’t fancy trying to navigate these woods, especially not while dragging the still-unconscious Skye along.

“Thomas,” Ward says quietly, “close your eyes.”

He does so at once, slapping his hands over them for good measure. Ward twists to face Jemma.

“Are his eyes closed?” he asks.

“ _Yes_ ,” Thomas says, with the sort of exasperation only a young child can manage. “I close my eyes every time you tell me to. The _first_ time,” he adds, sounding very wounded. “You don’t have to keep saying it.”

“They are,” Jemma says, slowly, as the implication of Thomas’ words sinks in. “You…tell him to close his eyes often?”

Ward shrugs one shoulder. “He’s a kid. A lot of what I do is—” He stops and shrugs again, less casually. “He shouldn’t have to see it.”

She has to take a moment to absorb that—that Ward cares at all what his dead brother sees, cares enough to try to protect him when he has no way of knowing if Thomas is present and, if so, whether he’ll even obey him.

She remembers, suddenly, what Thomas said back in the base—that Grant had _promised_ him he wouldn’t hurt her. That thought—or, more specifically, the image that accompanies it, of Ward making promises to no one, offering reassurance to thin air, all in the hopes of comforting a little boy who’s been dead for at least a decade—actually brings tears to her eyes.

The enemy he may be, but there’s obviously _some_ good in Ward. Remembering his easy acceptance of Skye’s hostility, Jemma feels guilty all over again for the mistaken impression she’s allowed the team to labor under.

“Well,” she says, grimacing at how oddly the lump in her throat has made her voice sound, “he would like you to know that he obeys you every time you say it. And he does it the first time, so you’ve no need to repeat yourself.”

“Good.” Ward smiles in obvious relief. It’s only a heartbeat, however, before it fades into—something else. Something more intent. “He’s still got ’em closed?”

Thomas sighs loudly.

“Yes,” she says.

“Good,” Ward repeats, and, reaching across the space between them, tugs her forward into a kiss.

Jemma would like to say that she pushes him away—or even that she _thinks_ to, that she hesitates to return the kiss—but she doesn’t. She melts into it at once, hand sliding into his hair to hold him as close as is possible with the seat between them.

It’s a very good kiss. Ward’s fingers are firm on her jaw, his mouth warm and sure against hers. The only other kiss they’ve ever shared was the morning before the uprising, and though this is very unlike that—deep and demanding where the other was slow and sweet—it makes her heart pound in exactly the same way.

She forgets Thomas, forgets Skye, forgets even the legion of soldiers no doubt searching for them at this very moment. Her whole world narrows until Ward is the only thing in it.

It’s not until her lungs are physically aching with the need for oxygen that he breaks the kiss—and even then, he doesn’t go far. He rests his forehead against hers, hand sliding away from her jaw to cup the back of her neck instead. Her skin burns in the wake of his touch.

“You ever gonna forgive me?” he asks. “For any of it?”

The question _should_ bring reality crashing back in, but it just…doesn’t. She knows he’s the enemy, knows he’s done horrible things and, worse, simply stood by and _allowed_ horrible things to happen, but somehow, it just doesn’t seem as important as it should. (As important as it was only _moments_ ago.) Her thoughts are a tangle consisting entirely of him: his lips and his hand, his hair soft beneath her fingers, his low voice lingering in the scant space between them.

She’s a horrible person.

She _wants_ to forgive him, is the thing. She wants to be able to forget what he’s done, to simply push all that aside and—and what? Trust that he’s sincere in the affection he claimed for her at the Hub? Affection that he claimed right before _shooting_ her?

With an ICER, a tiny, hopeful voice in the back of her mind reminds her. He could’ve killed her—and could’ve killed his way out of the military base they just left—but he didn’t.

That counts for something. Doesn’t it?

“That depends,” she murmurs. “Are you ever going to be sorry?”

In answer, he kisses her once more—briefly and chastely. Then he pulls away, twists to face the road, and shifts the car back into gear.

“You can open your eyes now, Thomas,” he says calmly, and Jemma sinks back against her seat, heart heavy and cold.

She’s fairly certain that was a no.

The rest of the drive passes in silence.


End file.
